


inches apart, even closer at heart

by vivalagay



Series: #stanhoneypup (honeypup one shots) [1]
Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Mention Of Homophobia, Parenthood, and man there's a lot of crying, their daughter dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-26
Updated: 2016-07-26
Packaged: 2018-07-26 11:21:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7572253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vivalagay/pseuds/vivalagay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Minhyuk has always been the rubber band holding them tightly together, and now that it's time for Jooheon to be strong, he doesn't know what to do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	inches apart, even closer at heart

**Author's Note:**

> my otp needs a lil love so here's my contribution ^^
> 
> i don't really say what illness kyung-mi had but i had one in mind and i didn't feel like doing a thorough analysis of it for a small one shot such as this so i just didn't mention what it was it just made things easier
> 
> title from "west" by sleeping at last

"I want a child," Minhyuk confesses at dinner one night. It's so sudden that Jooheon chokes on his ssam, coughing until Minhyuk's patting his back and pushing him a glass of water to down in one gulp.

Minhyuk isn't looking at him once his glass makes it back to the carpeted floor emptied. He stares at his folded legs, fingering a loose string from the ankle of his sweatpants.

"Are you serious?" Jooheon manages to choke out through watery eyes. "About the child thing?"

"Yes," he softly replies, but he doesn't pull his eyes away from the thread. "I know what you're thinking: I'm getting ahead of myself, that we haven't even planned our wedding yet and speaking of a child this early is bizarre, that we've had this talk before about waiting until we're entirely done with our education before even thinking about children. But I don't know if I can accept that anymore. I met someone today, a little girl, during my shift at the hospital. She doesn't say a lot of words, but I know that she doesn't have a family, and I know that I want so badly for us to change that. I really want us to be her family."

 "Are you sure you're not just feeling this way because you feel sorry for her?"

"I don't think so," he tells him. "I feel so sure. Really sure. I want her to be ours."

Jooheon isn't sure what to say. He feels uneasy, and in contrast, very unsure.

He thinks of what a hassle they'd have to go through just to get this little girl Minhyuk has only spoken to once, thinks of how she wouldn't even really belong to them. It's this little fact that worries him the most, and was the real reason Jooheon had told Minhyuk he wanted them to wait for a child, just until adopting her would be easier. However long that could take.

But then, Jooheon realizes Minhyuk is looking at him with those pleading eyes, and he feels his heart softening, not wanting to crush the hope that's sparkling in there so brightly. 

"Then," he finally says, "I guess I can meet her."

-o-

Jooheon thinks he isn't going to get it, but then he meets her and _entirely_ gets it.

There's not much that really separates Kyung-mi from any other child that he's ever spoken to (except she doesn't cry when Jooheon tries to greet her or reject his affection,) he just knows there's something there that _does_ separate her from any other child that he's ever spoken to, something inexplicable that makes him want to be her family just as badly as Minhyuk told him he wanted. 

She's as ebullient as Jooheon's fiancé, but shy and soft-spoken so that she's only fully heard when there's near to absolute silence. Jooheon finds it cute. It only makes him want to be able to pull this little girl under his wing even more and make sure she never has to spend another night in the hospital again. Jooheon makes sure to visit Minhyuk during his shifts much more often. 

Kyung-mi's always ecstatic when Jooheon drops by to say hello, and usually ends up causing him to stay much longer than he plans. It doesn't bother him, though, even if Jooheon has to stay up later to finish all of his assignments for school, and even if Jooheon finds his head lolling back during lecture halls and himself waking up from a slobbery page of a textbook in class. He just likes being able to make someone happy, and knowing that there's a small chance Kyung-mi has any other moments in her day where she has someone there willing to read books with two words per page and listen to her quietly speak incomplete, choppy sentences, makes the exhaustion much more worth it.

It comes to a point where she's seemingly all Jooheon and Minhyuk talk about. They're still waiting it out, still examining this situation from all angles, but their decision is already clear as day. Kyung-mi becomes undeniably close to Jooheon and Minhyuk, and Jooheon and Minhyuk the same. It's almost like they've already become a little family. 

The next time Jooheon visits her, Minhyuk is by his side with a stuffed panda—Minhyuk's idea, for some reason. Jooheon realizes she looks much more healthier, her face full of color and her gummy smile much brighter than Jooheon remembers. Minhyuk offers her the panda and she cradles it to her chest as if it were a little baby.

"For me?" she asks.

"Of course," Minhyuk tells her. He squats down to her height, along with Jooheon, as she happily caresses her new doll.

"We wanted to talk to you about something, since you seem to have taken a liking to us," Jooheon suddenly announces. He's not sure if it's the right moment to ask, but the question had been burning inside of him. He's not sure why he feels so nervous speaking to a three-year-old either, but suddenly, his hands feel a little clammy and his mouth runs a little dry. Minhyuk looks at him, softly smiling, and nodding his head for Jooheon to continue. "We were wondering if you'd like to see us more often, as in maybe... coming to live with us?"

She furrows her brows at the question, eyes darting between the two boys as she caresses the false fur of the panda bear, "Right now?"

"Not right now," Minhyuk laughs. "It may take a while, but soon enough. We'd like to be your family, Kyung-mi-yah, if you're okay with that."

Kyung-mi's hand pauses on the head of the stuffed animal, and she stares at them, contemplating this. Jooheon doesn't quite understand the look on her face. She seems a little confused as Jooheon expected her to be, and then he's worried that there's something else, something else like fear. Jooheon isn't sure if Minhyuk and him played their cards right, if they read her the wrong way. But then Kyung-mi's jumping from her hospital bed, little feet scurrying over to the two of them and suddenly her arms snaking around their legs into a hug.

It's enough of an answer.

-o-

"Pink is too predictable," Jooheon says. "Why don't we paint her room something like," he plucks a card from the row of previews,  "yellow?"

"But pink is so cute," Minhyuk whines, "and look, this shade is even called _frosted tulip_ , we have to get it."

"Everything we got for her is pink."

"Because Kyung-mi loves pink. She even always has these pink bows in her pigtails."

"I think _pineapple delight_ is better than _frosted tulip_." Jooheon plucks another card from the row. "I want her to always be surrounded by sunshine. What about _lemon curd_?"

" _Lemon curd_?" Minhyuk repeats, still shuffling through the different shades of pink. "That sounds disgusting."

"As if yours are any better!"

"Mine are ten times better." Minhyuk shows him two cards. "I'm stuck between _poetic princess_ , and this one called  _palace rose._ What do you think?"

"I think I don't want our daughter sleeping in a room that looks like the inside of a vagina—"

Minhyuk slaps Jooheon's shoulder, and then hits him again when all he's given is a loud laugh. "Gosh, why are you like this? I really can't take you anywhere."

"You asked."

Minhyuk stares at the two shades of pink in his hands, contemplating both before there's a long breath of air pushed from his lips. "Do you really think the yellow would look better?"

"Really, but," Jooheon returns the yellow cards to its row, "you're right, Kyung-mi does likes pink. I think we should go with _palace vagina_."

A smile tugs on the corners of Minhyuk's mouth until it's fully blossoming into a grin. "What is this? Is Jooheon easily backing down?"

"No, Jooheon isn't easily backing down," he says. "Jooheon is realizing that his fiancé is much more skilled in the kid area."

(But really, Jooheon just loves that something as simple as agreeing with Minhyuk's color can make his face light up so brightly.)

With no one around, Minhyuk shamelessly pecks him on the lips, before they're off strolling through the store again to continue their shopping for Kyung-mi, now adding anything in the cart that goes along with the uninteresting, predictable palace rose of Minhyuk's choice. It looks even worse when they've bought the bucket and morning time Minhyuk pops the lid off on the carpeted floor of Kyung-mi's room. 

"I hate to leave you to this all by yourself." Jooheon tucks his college textbook under an arm, frowning as his fiancé pulls an over-sized tee shirt over his clothing.

"It's fine," Minhyuk smiles. "I think painting will be fun, I'll finish in no time. But you have to promise me you'll be here to help furnish the room."

"Of course." He grips his chin, tilting his head up to kiss him. "I love you."

"I love you, too."

(Jooheon comes back that afternoon later than usual, the only light coming from the cracked door of Kyung-mi's room, and even through his face mask, Jooheon can smell the heavy scent of paint.

 "Minhyukie?" he calls into the apartment, before he's pushing the door open to his fiancé asleep on the floor and the walls surrounding him painted of sunshine.)

-o-

Kyung-mi bounces on her bed as soon as the door pushes open to her bedroom. She's much taller now with longer hair that's pulled back with two plaits, a pink flower clip holding it together. "Yellow!" she smiles, a finger pointed to the walls of her room.

"Ah," Minhyuk laughs, clinging tightly onto Jooheon's arm _,_ "she likes the yellow."

He grins. "Of course she does."

Kyung-mi scurries off the bed, and then runs around her new room to explore, searching through her closet and the drawer and the large box Minhyuk and Jooheon filled to the brim with toys.

Jooheon can't help how much he's smiling, even if his cheeks are aching with all the happiness he feels. He's just... relieved. Relieved that everything turned out the way he'd hoped, that Kyung-mi's well enough to run around her bedroom freely and happily as a child, relieved that this little girl belongs to them. Actually kind of to them.

Minhyuk turns to him and smiles. "Jooheon-ah, are you crying?"

"N-no."

"Aw," Minhyuk pinches at his cheek, as if Jooheon actually needed that, "it's okay to cry, babe."

"But I'm not crying," he argues, even as his lips tremble at the sentence and he doesn't bother fighting against the hug Minhyuk pulls him into.

-o-

Jooheon feels as if he's always been a parent, just as sometimes he feels as if there's never been a day in his life where Minhyuk wasn't his. Jooheon starts to rely on the small weight pouncing on Minhyuk and him every morning, or the little dip of the bed during the night whenever Kyung-mi thinks she has successfully broke their cuddling without either boys noticing, and there's walking down streets when Jooheon feels as if his hand is empty if there isn't a little one wrapping around his finger.

He doesn't think he's sucking at this dad thing as much as he expected himself to.

In retrospect, Jooheon's trying his best, and Minhyuk is the rubber band that keeps everything in place. Effortlessly, almost. It's a little envious the way he can do that, and, sometimes, a little worrying. But Jooheon has to remind himself Minhyuk has always been like this ever since they'd met in high school. Just buzzing around for opportunities to make himself useful, and Jooheon having to just let him. He doesn't really understand it most of the time, just as most of the time he can never really understand how his fiancé can stay so optimistic about everything, especially when it comes to Kyung-mi.

Jooheon's the one panicking when they give her medication ten minutes later than schedule, and the one with sweaty palms and bouncy knees at doctor's appointments whilst Minhyuk tries to comfort him.

"It's just a check-up," Minhyuk has to remind him every time. There's a slight laugh in his sentence that Jooheon hasn't really decided is there to console him or there to tease him. It helps Jooheon feel a little better hearing it anyway.

"I know."  He slips a hand from Minhyuk's and wipes it on the thighs of his jeans. "I'm just worried that we're not going to get good news, that's all."

"If we take good care of her then we should always get good news," Minhyuk says, intertwining their fingers once again, "and if you keep thinking that we aren't going to get good news then we're not going to, so stop thinking we won't."

Jooheon nods slightly and reciprocates the squeeze of Minhyuk's hand, trying to find a way to catch this optimism bouncing inside of him. It doesn't work and Jooheon can't keep his knees still, but nonetheless, Kyung-mi turns out fine. She always does.

Jooheon discovers it isn't that simple, though. It's when he comes home from school and there isn't a small, smiling face waiting to greet him, or Minhyuk by the coffeemaker to attack him with kisses and help his arms out the straps of his backpack. It's when he's stepping into Kyung-mi's room and she's still tucked in the bed, lying in the same position Jooheon had kissed her goodbye that morning in, and Minhyuk's crouched over her, patting her small face with a wet washcloth.

"Don't worry," is how Minhyuk greets him. He rests the washcloth on her forehead and then stands to kiss Jooheon. "She's fine."

"What happened?"

"It's just a headache," he tells him. "Kyung-mi says it doesn't hurt that badly. I wanted her to take a rest day anyway, so her headache will go away soon. Hopefully by tomorrow."

It doesn't. The next day Jooheon returns from school and Kyung-mi is still bed-ridden with a cold washcloth placed on her forehead. Jooheon convinces Minhyuk to allow him to take her outside, thinking that maybe she just needs a breath of fresh air, but she cries once they emerge into the sunlight and the next day there are curtains covering the two windows of her room.

Jooheon begins to believe optimism does nothing, or maybe his unease is due to the way Kyung-mi's words kind of slur when she speaks, and she decides that walking doesn't matter anymore or moving at that. Jooheon just thinks sometimes bad situations are evident, where as Minhyuk tries to find positivity in nearly everything, or at least, wait for this positive something to arrive.

"I don't think she's supposed to have a headache this long," Jooheon says when him and Minhyuk have finally gotten Kyung-mi to fall asleep at two AM and Jooheon's still trying to finish an essay due in five hours.

Minhyuk is lying beside him on the bed, his droopy eyes fixed on the ceiling. "She isn't."

"Then what do we do?"

"Make sure she feels better."

"What if we can't?"

"We will." 

"But what if we can't?"

Minhyuk doesn't reply, instead he sinks underneath the blankets and rolls over onto his side so that his back is facing him. "Turn the lights off when you've finished your work."

Jooheon never knew Minhyuk turning his back to him could feel so scary. He doesn't even remember the last night he'd fallen asleep without Minhyuk holding him, and he's sure Minhyuk doesn't remember either. Jooheon slips into bed at an ungodly hour and his arms are finding his torso and pulling him in, so easily, like how he's used to. Jooheon thinks this is the only way he's meant to fall asleep.

"I love you," Minhyuk mutters. "Sleep well."

"I love you, too."

-o-

It's when Kyung-mi throws up one morning she's taken to a doctor. Jooheon holds Minhyuk's hand so tightly his hand turns red, but he never tells him to let go.

"It's going to be okay," Minhyuk tells him as always, and Jooheon knows this—in a sense— but it's his job to feel nervous and Minhyuk's job to not feel nervous, so that it balances it out and Kyung-mi comes out okay.

Things don't really go as planned.

-o-

"I don't want to stay here," Kyung-mi whines as Minhyuk props her up on the hospital bed with a bundle of pillows. "I want to go home."

"I want you to go home, too," Minhyuk sighs. He places the last pillow underneath her and smiles. "You'll be home soon though, so there's nothing to worry about. The doctor just has to keep a little watch on you, and we will be here to stay with you also. We can watch movies and draw and make our stay fun."

Kyung-mi just frowns and stares at the wall.

"It's only for a little," Jooheon tries, even though it's almost as if it hurts to speak, but it's worth it. Minhyuk shoots him a smile from across the hospital bed that warms Jooheon a bit, thaws him out so that he can feel the tips of his fingers.

"I want to go home," Kyung-mi repeats.

"I know." Jooheon smooths a hanging strand of her black hair against the side of her face. "I know."

And Jooheon hates this. He hates having to pretend everything is okay. He hates worrying. He hates not knowing. He hates knowing. He hates that the doctor's words don't make much sense anymore. He hates seeing how hopeful Minhyuk is. He hates seeing Minhyuk taking care of Kyung-mi as well as he can and smiling as much as he has to and being what holds them all together. Jooheon hates that he sometimes sees him wearing out, as if any minute he'll just snap and everything will fall apart. Jooheon hates he doesn't know what to do. He hates that there feels like there really isn't anything to do.

"Do you think she's going to get any better?" he asks one morning Minhyuk decides to walk Jooheon to the bus stop.

Minhyuk squints at the sky. "Of course," he says.

"How are you sure?"

"Because I just am."

"But," Jooheon sighs, "how can you be so sure?"

"We take good care of her."

"What if it isn't enough?"

"Can you stop?" Minhyuk sharply replies. "Why do you have to be like this? Why can't you just think things will turn out okay for once? This has been a rough three weeks, I would like for you to not make it any more rough than it has to be."

"I just don't know what to do."

"You don't have to do anything!" He drops his head back to face the sky once again, shutting his eyes until he's ready to flutter them open and speak. "Just be here, Jooheon-ah, and be strong. That's all I ask, and it's all Kyung-mi needs right now. Is that too much to ask?"

Jooheon shakes his head. "I'm sorry. I'll do better."

Minhyuk sighs and softly nudges him from the sidewalk. "Go. Your bus is coming."

-o-

Jooheon is on the bus from school when he turns his phone back on with forty-three missed calls from Minhyuk, and a single voicemail. Jooheon can sense something is wrong even before he hears it, but it's all in Minhyuk's shaky voice to give it away. 

" _You need to come to the hospital_ ," is how it begins, " _as quickly as you can. Text me when you get this._ "

It's from over an hour ago.

Jooheon takes a random stop and runs as fast as he can until he makes it through the doors drenched in sweat, heart pounding, and legs aching. He still flies up the staircase to the floor Kyung-mi stays, anxiety twisting in his stomach before

until he's emerging from the elevator in what feels like a frantic. The halls feel endless. Jooheon loses the direction he's going, even if he's been walking through the same halls for the past few weeks to Kyung-mi's room, but he feels so dizzy and there are tears burning at his eyes because somehow this room has slipped from his mind and he doesn't know if Kyung-mi is okay and he doesn't know if everything is going to be okay anymore and oh God, how much he hopes everything is okay.

" _Jooheon-ah_ ," a voice calls. Jooheon whips around automatically, even before the first syllable can fully leave Minhyuk's mouth, and he freezes, because he knows. By the tears in Minhyuk's eyes and the unsteadiness in his hands. He knows, and he doesn't want to.

"It wasn't..." Minhyuk sucks in a breath and looks to the floor, tears rolling down his face and dripping from his chin, and Jooheon just shakes his head because he doesn't want to be right.

He's crossing his fingers that he isn't right, that Kyung-mi is okay and they'll check her out the hospital tonight and they'll go home, happy, as a family. But then Minhyuk is sinking to the floor, breaths ragged and shoulders shaking and there's this sound, as if he's screaming, a sound that causes Jooheon's stomach to spin and his eyes to burn, ringing throughout the hallway as Minhyuk lays every emotion inside of him on the hospital floor.

"It wasn't enough," Minhyuk finally chokes out. 

Jooheon doesn't cry. He thinks he's forgotten how to, just like how he's forgotten how to breathe and how to speak and how to think, but somehow Jooheon hasn't forgotten how to hold him. Right now it's all he can seem to do.

-o-

The bus ride home is silent. Jooheon looks from the window with a foggy mind, his fingers intertwined with Minhyuk's though it feels as if he's only holding onto air. It's almost as if he isn't even there at all. Eventually, Jooheon just lets go. 

He wonders how people get through this as they're walking through the front door of their house, reluctantly, like they fear it almost. Once Jooheon closes the door behind them, the emptiness of it tortuously palpable, he's sure that he is terrified. He wonders how people get through this as Minhyuk's crying begins again in soft, uneven sniffs, and Jooheon rests a hand on his shoulder that Minhyuk doesn't accept. In fact, he walks away, leaving his hand to limply fall by his side once again. Jooheon doesn't understand. His head hurts too much to.

The living room floor burns underneath him.

Jooheon wishes he could look over and see Kyung-mi on his right, where she'd always sit for meals, her face covered in whatever Minhyuk and Jooheon had happened to put together that day, as she happily makes a mess with her chopsticks. It's not fair that he can't depend on this every afternoon, every evening, that he can't feel her little hand tugging on his finger, that he can't depend on the smiling face bouncing in the screen door once he's returning from school, and those little arms instantly engulfing his legs in a hug. It's not fair that Minhyuk and Jooheon have so much love for her, just for Kyung-mi to be taken away from them. Jooheon feels a rush of anger, and then pain— _so_ much of it that he bursts into tears. 

Later, he understands Minhyuk is angry with him.

It's when Jooheon eases the door open to their bedroom. It's night, and with how long Minhyuk's stayed in the room with close to no sound, Jooheon expects him to be asleep, instead Minhyuk is sat in their computer chair, or laptop chair, seeing as their computer has been broken ever since Kyung-mi had run past the cords too closely. Jooheon remembers the most fear he ever felt being the rug burn she'd gotten from tangling in the cords and falling. Life has really outdone itself.

"You should've been there."

Jooheon looks at his fiancé, brows furrowing. "What?"

"You should've been there for Kyung-mi," Minhyuk repeats. His voice is low, angry, in a tone Jooheon doesn't think he's ever heard it before. "But you weren't there. You didn't answer any of my calls. You were too late. You weren't there for her."

"My phone was off —"

"She wanted you," he says, "really badly. I was going to stop calling, but she made me call you over and over again. She felt so ill. She said hearing your voice would make it better —"

" _Stop_."

Minhyuk stares at him, tears brimming his eyes, and it's almost as if he's asking _why should I?_

"You should've been there for her," he eventually concludes.

It's not much of a conclusion, since somehow Minhyuk and Jooheon explode into anger, screaming at each other until their throats are sore and Jooheon's having to lock himself in the laundry room to get away from him.

Minhyuk still shouts, even from the other side of the door, and all Jooheon can do is digest it all, every word reminding him how much of a coward he is as if he needs to be reminded. It's evident, just from the way his knees shake and the dampness of his hands, to how everything is suddenly falling apart and all Jooheon can do is sit in a room smelling of cheap detergent and muffling his sobs with the palm of his hand. 

That night they sleep facing away from each other, but Jooheon wouldn't really call it _sleep_. He can't even bring himself to close his eyes.

His back feels bare without Minhyuk pressed into it, and it feels like a stab to his chest at the sound of Minhyuk's cries through the whole night. He wishes he could _do_ something, but Jooheon isn't really the one for doing somethings. He never has to, because that's Minhyuk's job, and Jooheon just follows Minhyuk's lead and hopes not to get in the way and ruin everything.

It's a weak system, but a system that'd never showed itself to be something he couldn't rely on. Until now, of course.

Jooheon makes a meal for Minhyuk a week later. It's supposed to be an apology of some sorts, although Jooheon isn't sure why he feels apologetic, but he knows he's tired of silence and he's tired of staying awake each night wishing Minhyuk could just roll over and hold him. Minhyuk isn't, though.

"I don't feel like getting up," he says after Jooheon asks him to come to the living room. Minhyuk barely looks at him, even though there's really not much else in their bedroom for Minhyuk to look at it.

"I'll bring it to you then?"

Minhyuk doesn't protest, so Jooheon organizes everything on a tray and brings it into the room for him, cautiously, to keep anything from falling. He expects Minhyuk to smile at the entrance of food and Jooheon's strong effort to put it together, or at least, a reaction that isn't the frown that tugs on his face.

"I'm not hungry," he says.

"Could you just have a little bite?" Jooheon tries. "The pork was a bit pricey."

"I'm not hungry," he repeats.

"Why do we have to be like this?" Jooheon sets the tray down on the dresser and plops on the bed in front of Minhyuk. It's so that he doesn't have a choice besides looking at him, but Minhyuk doesn't go with Jooheon's intentions. He stares at the covers and the wall and the useless monitor on the counter desk—anything that keeps him from looking at Jooheon. "We shouldn't be arguing. We should be getting through this together." 

"That's funny, since you weren't even there for me and Kyung-mi. When I think about it, you were barely there for anything."

Jooheon pauses. "What are you talking about?"

"Of course." Minhyuk bitterly laughs, and then exhales, shakily. "Why don't we pretend you weren't always off at school and always off doing your work, and how I was left trying to fix everything on my own and how you were perfectly okay with it? That seems to be the way you work with things, anyway, you just run away and hide."

"You know that's not true."

"Do I?"

Jooheon stares at him. He tries to speak, but there aren't any words that come to him. Even if there were, there's still this lump in his throat keeping him silent. He turns to leave, but Minhyuk calls after him, softly, instantly sending Jooheon whipping around to face him. He smiles a little, because maybe there's a chance they could patch this up again. 

"You forgot your tray," he says.

_Oh._

Jooheon grabs it and rushes out of the door. He tells himself that everything will be okay. He tells himself that soon Minhyuk's arms will be around him when they fall asleep again, that Minhyuk will be there to help him get through this and Jooheon will be, too, that everything with turn out okay. But Jooheon has never been well with this positivity thing.

He slams the tray onto the kitchen counter, and as the plates and bowls clatter over and spill onto the kitchen floor, Jooheon cries. They're warm, angry tears that blind his vision and roll all the way down to his neck whilst Jooheon dumps his entire meal into the trash and cleans up the mess he'd made and scrubs at all the dishes with so much anger inside of him that a cup shatters right in his palm. His hands bleed, but Jooheon doesn't notice. He just grabs another cup.

-o-

It doesn't get better. Jooheon stops expecting it to. There's no talking to Minhyuk; there's only screaming. It seems as if shouting is the only way to get Minhyuk to listen to him, and even then, it's as if Jooheon's screaming at a brick wall. He doesn't know why they fight. He's pretty sure it's not even about Kyung-mi anymore. Her name becomes a weapon, and Minhyuk uses it all the time.

Jooheon's sick of it. He's sick of the fights and he's sick of crying all the time and he's sick of feeling lonely and empty and only ever being able to see Kyung-mi's smile and hear her laugh whenever he's sleeping.

He's sick of everything.

"Shut up!" Jooheon's hands are clenched into fists, and he feels as if his skin is burning. He doesn't remember why, though. He doesn't remember why Minhyuk and him are both at the verge of tears or remember why Minhyuk has thrown his pillow onto the couch and thrown all of his clothes out into the living room. "For once in your life just shut up! Do you think Kyung-mi would want to hear us fighting like this?"

"Don't talk to me about what Kyung-mi wants as if you would even know!" Minhyuk shouts back, just as loud and just as angry. "Don't talk to me about Kyung-mi at all! You —"

"I get it. I fucking get it. I get that I didn't try hard enough —"

"Good!"

"— I get that I'm a terrible father! I get that I wasn't there for either of you, and I feel like shit about it every day so stop throwing it in my face because _I fucking get it!_ "

Jooheon's crying so hard he feels as if his ribs are going to burst. He leans against the wall and slides until he's sat on the floor with his head hung between his knees and his body trembling. When he calms down, he sees that all of his things have been taken from the living room, along with his pillow, and it's right beside Minhyuk's, where it should be.

Jooheon thinks this is a step forward, and that maybe Minhyuk and him can recover what they had. Just maybe

And then it's two weeks later and Jooheon notices Minhyuk's engagement ring neglected on the kitchen counter.

-o-

"How long has this been off you?"

The ring drops onto the coffee table and rolls, circular, before reaching its destination beside Minhyuk's lunchbox and falling off from its side. Minhyuk freezes at the sight of it and gapes, his chopsticks falling from his grip, as if the ring wasn't left in the open for Jooheon to see.

"I meant to talk to you about it," Minhyuk decides to say.

"When?"

"I don't know," he murmurs. "I guess I... I guess I wasn't actually planning on talking about it."

Jooheon feels a lump in his throat that he struggles to swallow. "Do you not want to be with me?"

Minhyuk looks to his food, frowning, and Jooheon waits. He feels impatient, but really, he could wait all day.

He's afraid of the response. He's afraid that after all of this fighting, after the many times Jooheon cried and then cheered himself up with the thought of them fixing things that Minhyuk will look to him and say _yeah, I don't want to be with you_.

He sighs instead, a deep, breathy sigh. "I don't know," Minhyuk mutters.

"Really?" he says. "Do you even still love me?"

Minhyuk fiddles with his fingers, and then looks at him, slightly, before he's quickly turning away and crying into his hands. 

Jooheon never gets a reply. He doesn't need to.

-o-

He packs his bags once Minhyuk is asleep on the couch. His legs are pulled to chest and he's fallen asleep with a pair of glasses crookedly rested on the bridge of his nose.

Jooheon wraps him in a blanket and slips the glasses from his face, slowly to not wake him, and pauses. He's so peaceful that it breaks his heart. Minhyuk is so beautiful this way. Jooheon wishes he could keep him like this all the time. He wishes he could've been good enough for Minhyuk to stay in love with him; he wishes he could make him smile the way he used to; he wishes he could hear Minhyuk's laugh again. 

"I love you," he says. The words burn in his throat as he presses a kiss to Minhyuk's temple and gets up, gathering his bags, and leaves.

There's an ache in his stomach once he's sat in the cab, turning off his phone and curling up next to the window. He's sure Minhyuk wouldn't call him. He's sure this is what Minhyuk wants, that Minhyuk has been on the verge of leaving Jooheon ever since Kyung-mi had died. He can't help but shed a few tears, even if he's so tired of crying. It's a little surprising that there are even still tears left for him to shed.

He stays in a hotel and tries going to school again. His mind is always elsewhere, though, always wondering how Minhyuk is doing and if he's better now that Jooheon has left him, if he's found a way to fill the hole that Kyung-mi has left. He wonders when his brain will learn to forget him and move on, but it seems as if it never will.

Jooheon finds a piece of Kyung-mi and Minhyuk in everything. There's even a time where he zips open his suitcase and finds Kyung-mi's sock tangled with the heap of clothes he'd blindly thrown in there. Jooheon expects himself to cry, but he just stares, holding her little sock in his hand as his chest tightens and tightens until he's gasping for air.

He seems to get even worse. Waking every morning without Minhyuk lying beside him feels useless. He even misses the arguing, at least he was hearing his voice, even if Minhyuk was angry with him and falling out of love with him every single time.

It makes Jooheon start hating himself, all this anger towards Minhyuk suddenly enveloped and left only for himself. Jooheon thinks it's pretty accurate to think he's hated himself this whole time, ever since Kyung-mi left that day and Jooheon couldn't have been there for her, every time Minhyuk glared at him and reminded him how much he needed to be there, how terrible he is for not for being there.

Jooheon knows. He always did.

-o- 

There's a day Jooheon's at a convenience store, restocking on snacks for the new hotel he's moved to. He looks terrible, he's sure of it, since he didn't exactly bother looking at himself before trudging to the store from across the street. He didn't think of styling his hair before leaving, and with the sleep deprivation, he's sure there are some impressive bags and dark circles under his eyes. Of course, this day, his mom decides to drop from nowhere it seems. 

Jooheon freezes when he sees her and hides behind a shelf, because there's no way, under no circumstances, is he in any condition to see her. He hasn't spoken to his mom since he'd came out in high school. There'd been times where he'd seen her, from afar, but that was a few years ago when Jooheon was in the first year of college and Minhyuk and him rented an apartment together.

"Jooheon-ah?" she questions. Jooheon doesn't remember seeing her move from where he'd been watching her and he jumps, whipping around to face what he really doesn't want to. She seems a little confused and Jooheon wonders if he looks bad enough to coax her into believing that she'd confused him with someone else.

Instead, he sucks in a breath and, "Yes?"

"You don't look good at all."

 _Nice._ Jooheon tries to smile, but he's sure it looks pretty repulsive. "Um?" is all he can think of to say.

Somehow, minutes later, he ends up in a coffee shop, sitting at a table across from his mom who he hasn't spoken to in four years, fiddling with his fingers underneath the table and halfheartedly sipping from a lukewarm cup of coffee. 

"Tell me how you've been," she says. Jooheon's sure she doesn't actually care. It's been pretty evident that she doesn't care about him, or who he is, or what his life is like.

"I've been good," Jooheon says, which is a lie, but it's the answer everyone looks for when they ask that question anyway.

"Really? You look like you haven't slept in ages."

"I sleep," he tells her. It's not much a lie, whether he sleeps for only thirty minutes or not, it's still sleep.

"Are you sure you're okay?"

"Yes, I'm sure."

She hesitantly accepts this response, and then sips from her coffee, slowly, before finally asking a question Jooheon was anticipating to arrive, "Are you still with that guy?"

Jooheon doesn't look up. "Minhyuk," he corrects.

"Oh, right. Him. Are you still with him, Minhyuk?"

"Uh..." Jooheon eyes the ring on his finger and runs a hand over his face. "I guess I'm not really sure anymore. Probably not."

"What kind of response is that?"

"I just... I don't know. It got complicated, I guess. I moved out."

Jooheon expects something like _if you were with a girl, it wouldn't be complicated_ , or something else that'd make him regret even responding when she'd called his name in the store. But instead, her brows furrowed. She actually seems concerned, and  Jooheon wonders if the lack of sleep has him hallucinating. 

"Is that why you don't look okay?" she asks next.

Jooheon looks to his hands underneath the table. "Yes, kind of."

"I don't understand why you've left this guy—"

"Minhyuk."

" _Minhyuk_ , if he has such an affect on you."

"It's not like that. I don't think he really wants me around anymore."

"Did he say that?"

"Well, no—"

"Then you can't be too sure."

"It's... complicated, you don't really understand our circumstances."

"What if I told you last month Minhyuk came to see your father and I?"

Jooheon pauses. "What?"

"He came to us crying and told us that he ruined everything between you two, and that you had left him," she continues. "I don't really know how I feel about all this yet, but I know that this Minhyuk does really care about you, and according to how stressed you look, you really do care about him, too. It may not be as complicated as you think."

Jooheon smiles, a little, and it feels so strange against his lips, but he's smiling and he thinks he actually sort of feels happy and he thinks that _yeah, maybe it isn't_.

-o-

He finds himself knocking on the door of their apartment, anxiety twisting in his stomach, and there's so much uncertainty that he feels, so much of it that Jooheon questions if maybe he should've just stayed away. But the door eases open, and Jooheon can't really back away now. Minhyuk gasps when he sees him, and then tugs at the sweater he has on—Jooheon's sweater—before stepping into the outdoors.

"I want us to be together," Jooheon says. Minhyuk blinks at him, and slightly smiles, but it's so small Jooheon's not sure if he'd just imagined it. "I want us to be okay also. I want us to get through this together and get better, but I can't do it alone. I don't know how. I've always had you to look to and now I don't know what I'm supposed to do."

Minhyuk plays with the bottom of Jooheon's sweater and looks to his feet, staring with a silence that fills Jooheon with discomfort.

He thought this greeting would be enough to have Minhyuk talking, and he feels his stomach twisting again with so much anxiety he's prepared to just walk away, pretend this never happened, until he hears a sniff and notices the tear that drips from the tip of Minhyuk's nose, staining the concrete underneath their feet. 

Jooheon's unsteady hands cup Minhyuk's face, his thumb still happening to catch the tear that falls from Minhyuk's eye so naturally, it's almost as if he'd never left, almost as if Jooheon had never slept any short nights without him, almost as if they'd never stayed up screaming at each other. Almost.

Minhyuk looks like he wants to hit him, and he does, right in the chest, and then he shoves him and shoves him again when Jooheon's hands reach out to touch him.

"I hate you," he says. His voice is quiet, and it wavers, like the trembling of the clenched fists by his side. "I hate you so much."

"What do I do?" Jooheon asks. "Tell me and I'll do it."

Minhyuk eyes the ground as if it'd give him an answer, and Jooheon moves closer to him, hesitantly, slipping his hand underneath Minhyuk's chin and forcing him to look at him.

And it hurts because he can see how much pain Minhyuk is in, how scared he looks, how maybe this whole time Minhyuk just needed someone to be there for him, to cry with him, even someone to blame, and as always, Jooheon had just run away. He hates himself even more, but for the meantime, he forgets this, because suddenly Minhyuk's arms are wrapping around him and pulling him in, holding him so close, so tightly as if he's afraid of Jooheon slipping away.

"You stay, you idiot," Minhyuk finally says throughout a sob. Jooheon kisses him and feels himself becoming warm, almost becoming whole. "You stay," he whispers to his lips, "and you never leave."

Jooheon never does.

**Author's Note:**

> follow my [mx](https://nottechae.tumblr.com/) and [honeypup](http://joominty.tumblr.com/) tumblr and scream with me!!!


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